Corbin Bleu: Recent News

Nov 30, 2009

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Corbin Bleu: Snapshot

Name: Corbin Bleu
Date of Birth: February 21, 1989
Birth Place: Brooklyn, N.Y.

Disney Channel's High School Musical made mop-topped Corbin Bleu a certified heartthrob.

The Brooklyn native has been working professionally since the age where most tykes are just learning to talk (by 4, he landed gigs for Life cereal, and by 7, he was guest starring on ER). But it was the lead role in the 2004 feature film Catch That Kid and the Discovery Kids TV series Flight 29 Down that made Bleu a tween staple.

Bleu's career exploded after HSM: he took the lead in Disney Channel's Jump In, released a solo album and reprised his role as Chad Danforth in High School Musical 2 and the 2008 big screen version, High School Musical 3: Senior Year, which topped the box office. Bleu went on to shed his wholesome image in the failed CW pilot, The Beautiful Life.

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Corbin Bleu: Video

Star Talk

Corbin Bleu, who plays Chad in the Disney Channel's High School Musical, says he'd like to study psychology one day because "all my friends call me up for advice." When we heard that, we decided to test the 18-year-old's skills – since we already know he's a showbiz sensation.

(03:11)

Corbin Bleu: Five Fun Facts

Corbin Bleu's curly 'do doesn't do itself: "I wash it every day, then comb it, put conditioner in and get the knots out," he told PEOPLE. "Then I bend over, shake it and it goes 'poof!' It's my trademark, if I tried to cut it I'd have an angry mob after me."
Corbin Bleu's big TV break in 1996 came courtesy of his back end. "I worked on ER when I was 7," he told PEOPLE. "My character needed a rabies shot, and the scene is me bending over, wincing, and George Clooney giving me a shot in my butt."
Corbin Bleu had his first kiss on a ride at Knott's Berry Farm. "It just got completely pitch-black and she kissed me, and I wasn't expecting it," he told Girls Life magazine. "I backed off at first 'cause I was like, 'Whoa.' Then I realized what happened, and, you know, I kissed her back."
Think it's easy to jump rope like Corbin Bleu did in Jump In!? Think again. "I trained for about two months, boxing for two hours and practicing double Dutch for about three hours every day," he told the Detroit Free Press. "I was in the best shape of my entire life."
Although he's best-known for his High School Musical role as basketball star Chad Danforth, Corbin Bleu isn't a natural-born b-ball player. "I had to work so hard in order to make myself look good with a basketball for High School Musical. Basketball is not my forte!" he told New Jersey's Asbury Park Press.

Corbin Bleu: Biography

1989: February 21
Out of the Bleu
Actor David Reivers and his wife Martha welcome their first child, Corbin Bleu, in Brooklyn. By age 4, Bleu signs with Ford Modeling Agency and appears in commercials for Life cereal and ads for Macy's, Target, and Gap. In 1995, he makes his stage debut in the off-Broadway play, Tiny Tim Is Dead, in which he plays a homeless, mute boy.
1996: December 12
Back(side) to Bleu
A 7-year-old Bleu appears in his first television show, ER (right). "My character needed a rabies shot," he tells PEOPLE a decade later. "The scene is me bending over, wincing, and George Clooney giving me a shot in my butt."
2004: February 06
Catch This Kid
Just weeks before his 15th birthday, Bleu stars as one of the leads in Catch That Kid. He plays computer whiz Austin in the film, which the Boston Globe calls a "slick little package that will seem patently ridiculous to anyone past adolescence even as their younger brothers and sisters eat it up." The Ocean's Eleven-for-kids flick puts Bleu on the tween star map.